[Write On Wednesday] Christmas Redux

It’s the perfect time to write a Christmas/New Year/Winter story!

Don’t believe me? Take a lesson from the wily Dutch.

Everybody knows that the time to plant spring bulbs is in the autumn and yet every spring I receive multiple catalogues from dutch tulip and daffodil distributors. Six months after (or before) I should (have) plant(ed) their products. What lunacy is this?

The bulb marketers know that in spring I’m experiencing floral beauty and regretting not having planted more bulbs last year. It’s all fresh. I can see where I could put this Red Matador and that Orange Empress to fill a scraggy gap in my flower beds. I am full of good intentions about next year.

And, in January, is that not how you feel? As you pack away the holiday decorations, are you not full of regret over the things not done? The gifts unsought? The cards unsent? Is the memory of your brother-in-law’s annual jokes about your dessert not fresh in your memory?

Indeed. So now is the perfect time to write a story set in the season we have just endured enjoyed.

The Prompt

Write A December/Jan Holiday Story[1. No, I’m not conducting a War on Christmas. I, myself, celebrate Christmas. I just feel it’s polite to acknowledge the other 68% of humanity. It has less punch than “write a Christmas story”, I grant you. But if that’s the price for doing unto others, then I’m willing to pay it here in my blog…]

Tips

  • Think back over this past season and watch for strong emotions that pop up. What are they related to? Regrets? Vows of ‘never again’? Longing for next year’s repeat? Write those things down.
  • Think of moments that stood out for you. Why? What was the emotional resonance?
  • Think of a character you can put in a seasonal story who wants something. It can be something that is in tune with the message of the season or at odds with it, but they must feel strongly about it.
  • Now go about messing with their day. Put obstacles in their path. Put obnoxious visitors underfoot. Burn the turkey. Send in the ghosts of Christmas to settle their hash. Whatever works for your story…

Go!

There. Now you have a story ready to post on your blog/submit to a seasonal publication in early autumn/send out with your Christmas cards next Black Friday (you are going to send Christmas cards next year, aren’t you? Unlike this year? I know, I know, it’ll be our little secret…)

Now, excuse me while I check my mailbox for the Breck’s Bulb Catalogue…

 

 

(Do you send out a holiday story in seasonal cards to your friends? Make a note now on your calendar to do this next year!)

[Write on Wednesday] Day 1 Of Your New Routine: Madlibs

I know, it’s January 14 and you haven’t quite got that whole ‘Write Every Day’ thing down yet. I’m not sure many of us have.

So here’s a ‘story formula’ prompt to get you going again. Today is Day One of your new routine. Yes, you! You know I’m talking to you!

(Take heart! Any day can be Day One!).

Go through this exercise quickly and then write a fast & messy story from it. Have fun. No pressure! No standards! Post it, if you dare, in the comments!

Go!

 

Follow along with this exercise to get your creative juices flowing:

why do [these people] never [verb][nouns]?

(e.g. Why do corporate raiders never fall in love with the woman who owns the indy bookstore they are about to destroy? OR, my husband’s suggestion: “Why do chemists never eat broccoli?”)

What would happen if they suddenly did?

(e.g. What would happen if Tom Hanks fell in love with the adorkable indy bookseller? OR What would happen if a chemist suddenly tempted fate by eating the forbidden brassica?)

What if they stopped? What if they didn't?

(e.g. What if Tom Hanks resists Meg Ryan’s charms? OR What if Tom’s bosses tell him to break it off, but he doesn’t? Two different stories, no?)

What if their friends staged an intervention

(Imagine Tom’s bosses, or our chemist’s colleagues, sitting around in a room, ready to lay out the stakes for Tom, the chemist, and the story, not to mention the adorkable lady bookseller and/or the diminishing stores of broccolonium, the one potential source of Everything This Planet Needs, that non-chemists are wantonly chowing down on, right left and center!)

What if we walked into the room just before they decide how to respond?

(Take a moment to picture this in your mind. Who’s there? Who does it matter to?)

We can see [nouns]

(Who is there? Where are they? Standing? Sitting? What does their posture tell us? Where is our hero? What’s in the room with them? What does that lend to the atmosphere? What do the objects in the room tell us about the overall setting of the story? What do the objects tell us about the tone of the scene? Corporate furniture=an ambush. Cosy bookstore=Our hero on home turf)

We can hear [what?]. We can smell [what?]

(What details can you draw on to color in the scene for the reader?)

It feels...

(Is the atmosphere convivial? Is it adversarial? Are people witty? Are there undercurrents? What are those undercurrents?)

Start Your Story Now

 (Write anything! Except the broccoli story. That one’s mine!)

Bonus Points: Post your story in the comments. Read and comment on other people’s stories.

How did they turn out? Did you get something original and *you*? Did you write something different from everyone else?

[Write On Wednesday] Effin’ Elf

Elf on the Shelf
My Facebook feed and RSS reader are full of posts from angst-ridden parents who already—three days in—hate their stupid Elf On The Shelf[1. A craze that took off a couple of years ago and is like the Tooth Fairy crossed with an advent calendar, and a nightmare for parents].

People seem to be held hostage to this thing at the same time that they are plagued[2. thanks to Pinterest postings from uber-mommies] by a sense of inadequacy and overwhelm.

The Prompt

Imagine a character who is trapped in a situation beyond their control for a finite amount of time. Write their story.

Tips

  • What is the situation and why is it so torturous for THIS particular character?
  • How do they react on Day 1. How does that change by Day 15?
  • What is the crisis point? What brings things to a head?
  • What hilarious (or terrifying) events happen at the climax?
  • What fallout does this have for the character and the people around him/her?
  • What lessons are learned at the end? What vows are made?
  • Think about something that drives YOU crazy. Create a character who is also driven crazy by this thing, but make them more extreme. Amplify everything. Make the lows lower than they ever get for you. Make the highs higher.

Go!

 

[Write On Wednesday] Overwhelmed

The Prompt

Write a story about a character who is, in the moment the story takes place, completely overwhelmed.

Tips

  • This story can be dramatic, comedic, or both!
  • Perhaps your character is, oh I don’t know, preparing for a big family holiday on top of all their normal commitments. How do they feel? What are their triggers?
  • Give the character a moment of crisis that forms the kicking-off point for the plot of the story. Then think about how he/she would react on a good day, and how differently they react under stress. Show us that reaction.
  • Brainstorm three or four things that could be the tipping point for your stressed character and choose your favorite.
  • Start right at the tipping point and then make things much, much worse: if your character is planning for Thanksgiving dinner, let her always-better-then-her sister call to say she’s inviting a food critic as her date. Then break your main character’s oven. Then let Grandma get a surprise pass from the nursing home, and have her turn up in full foul-mouthed-rebellion-mode; give your character hives; there should probably be a point at which the police turn up…that kind of thing 🙂

 

  • Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Groundhog Day

This morning I dreamed I woke up and told my husband about my dream. Then I woke up and told him about my dream. And I STILL hadn’t had my coffee yet.

VERY Groundhog Day!

The Prompt

Write About A Repeating Routine/Event

Tips

[Write On Wednesday] Laughter

Following up on the recent theme of emotional writing prompts, here’s one that’s good for a laugh.

smile!
smile! by Lin Pernille Photography LLC, on Flickr

The Prompt

Write A Story That Features Laughter

Tips

  • Laughter can be cleansing, hysterical (in a bad way), nervous, comradely, cruel. Pick one, or cram as many as possible into one story.
  • Think about the physicality of laughter at the moment it happens.
  • Think about the emotions the memory of the laughter (happy or cruel) elicits later.
  • Use the moment of laughter as a plot device. It is the start or the end of something. It is some place/time/state your character wants to get back to or escape from.
  • If you’re showing laughter-following-a-joke, take a tip from Joss Whedon’s Firefly. He has a couple of scenes where he skips the joke and cuts straight to the characters laughing uproariously at whatever was said just off camera. That saves the audience from having to analyze the joke (“was it really that funny?”) and allows them to watch how the laughing characters react and interact. It allows for the sense of catharsis from the laughter without having to share the writer’s sense of humor. (Watch for the dinner scene in the episode Out Of Gas, around the 5:00 min mark).

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Anger

Continuing a trend from last week and the week before, here’s another prompt that leads you into plot via your main character’s emotion.

Rage Wallpaper
Rage Wallpaper by Thoth God of Knowledge, on Flickr

The Prompt

Write A Story That Features Anger

Tips

  • You can start your story with an angry outburst then spend the rest of it unpacking what prompted the rage, or exploring the consequences of one person’s rage for all the characters around them.
  • You can build up to a big, angry finish — showing your character giving in to something they’ve been fighting all the way through the story.
  • Think about how you have experienced anger in your own life — both in yourself and observing it in others.
  • Try to get inside the head of someone who has a very different ‘anger vector’ than yourself. (If you’re a ‘push me for weeks until I explode’ person, think about writing a character who is a ‘rage and forget it’ sort).
  • Remember there is such a thing as righteous anger.
  • To avoid the story becoming too intense, use the concept of the opposite emotion to show that your character(s) is/are capable of other emotions too. (What is the opposite of anger? Depends on the type of anger, doesn’t it? It might be charm, or humor, or kindness, or gentleness.
  • How can you tell a story that includes one character containing two opposing attributes. Think about what a character like that wants and go from there).
  • What kind of language will you use? Animal metaphors? Short, choppy sentences? Dialogue? How will you avoid clichés?

Go

 

[Write On Wednesday] Joy

Write A Story In Which A Character Experiences Joy

Continuing on from last week’s prompt about a character experiencing an emotion, this week we’re focusing on Joy.

joy!
joy! by atomicity, on Flickr

The Prompt

Write A Story In Which A Character Experiences Joy

Tips

  • How to define ‘joy’? I’m going with ‘a momentary experience of intense happiness’, though CS Lewis famously mixed that feeling of happiness with one of ‘longing’ in his definition of joy.
  • The main character does not have to be the character experiencing the moment of joy. They can be an observer.
  • How do the characters observing the joy-filled character’s behavior react? Do they reflect the joy? Do they feel bereft because they lack it? Do they envy the other person? Do they show that directly by being sad, or do they bury it and act like a jerk?
  • Will the joyful moment happen at the beginning of your story and kick off all the events that follow? Will the character be sustained by the fleeting sensation or spend a miserable existence in a futile attempt to recapture it?
  • Will you build up to the moment of joy at the end of your story (huge climax? Happy ending?)
  • What does it actually feel like to experience (or witness) joy?
  • What kind of a character could really use a little joy, and how can you put them in a situation where they experience it? Do they deserve it? Does that matter?

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Homesick

Write A Story In Which A Character Is Homesick

Character is king, in stories, but how can you make your character more realistic? Share an emotion that all of us have experienced. Examine it in the context of what your plot is doing to the character. This is an especially useful skill to work on if your stories tend to be set in fantastic, futuristic or historical settings. We can’t easily identify with Frodo fighting off goblins, but we can feel his pain as he longs for the Shire (and shed a tear when he and Sam face the reality that they probably won’t make it home again).

The Prompt

Write A Story In Which A Character Is Homesick

Tips

  • Make the homesickness fuel the plot somehow – have the character make a truly stupid decision in reaction to their homesick impulse. Or have them do whatever it takes to overcome it.
  • Put the homesickness in a surprising context — maybe a soldier finds himself ‘homesick’ for the place he had the worst experience of his life; maybe a 90 year old immigrant smells something that catapults her back to her childhood in a faraway land…
  • Maybe it’s not your main character who is homesick. Who else could be homesick and how would that affect your protagonist?
  • Are the people around the homesick character sympathetic? Impatient? Uncomprehending? Oblivious? Why?
  • Lead the reader through the emotions of homesickness as your character experiences it. Is it an ache in their forearms as they resist the temptation to call their old home phone number and see who answers? Is it a yawning hollow in their belly, as if they’ll never be able to eat enough to fill it? Is it a prickle behind their eyelids and a digging of nails into palms? Think about how you’ve felt when you’ve had that yearning to go home again.
  • If you’re not managing to conjure up the emotions to mine, try this: go to Google maps. Type in the address of somewhere you went once, for a shining hour or day or year — somewhere that holds special memories for you. Go into Street View. (Look up your first family home, your first school, that place you went on vacation once and had the torrid affair with  a local boy…). Look at the light, the sky, the architecture, the sidewalks, the window frames, the shop fronts. What do you feel? What do you notice? What had you forgotten? Use details like this to make your character’s longing for home seem real to a reader.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] An Argument

A Pretty Argument
A Pretty Argument by Just Ard on Flickr

Today I was writing a scene for a longer story in which my fish-out-of-water character comes up against people she has befriended but disagrees with. It’s very difficult for her to do this, and it was so much fun to write, that I’m recommending you try something similar.

The Prompt

Write A Story Centered Around An Argument

Tips

  • Make sure you make it clear what each character wants and what the stakes are for each character in this argument (in my case, my main character desperately wants to fix a mistake she has made that had consequences for her new friends, without getting them in more trouble. They want to help her and she’s determined to go it alone. The new friends variously want to help her because: they like her; they have a lot to lose too; it’s the right thing to do; they’re bored and want adventure; and simply to take advantage of an opportunity to tease a big brother mercilessly. Each character in the argument has a reason to be in it.)
  • Think about how you FEEL when you’re in an argument. Try to use some of that physicality — but without resorting to cliché. Be outrageous. Make up new metaphors that suit your setting. Have fun with this. You can always edit them out later.
  • If you want this to be more than a ‘talking heads’ situation, have your characters DO something as they argue: maybe they’re hiking along a dangerous ridge so they must remain in control or they risk plunging over the edge; maybe they’re doing the dishes; maybe they are hiding from the bad guys and the whole argument must be whispered…
  • Have some fun with this. Let your characters say things you would NEVER say, because you’re such a nice person (you are, aren’t you?)

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Fall Into Autumn

Fall is coming (at least in my hemisphere). Can you smell it? Do you live somewhere with autumn colors. Have you ever been to a place like that? Have you missed it? Have you never lived somewhere like that and wonder what all the fuss is about.

The Prompt

Write a Story With An Autumn Theme

Tips

  • You can do bonfires, leaves, Halloween, whatever your local ‘color’ is.
  • If it’s not autumn where you live, think of this as ‘banking’ a story that you can revise and begin to submit to seasonal markets in the next couple of months. Lead times, people, lead times!

[Write On Wednesday] – Write A Letter

dear joe
Photo by Meredith Harris CC Some Rights Reserved

Today’s prompt was suggested by the story I read yesterday, Incognito by Susan M. Lemere.

The Prompt

Write a story in letter form

Tips

  • Use two or more voices, or let us see only one side of the conversation.
  • The ‘letters’ can be email exchanges, text messages, Facebook updates, or imaginary hand-written correspondence from sweethearts separated by war, an ocean, feuding parents…whatever makes sense to you.
  • Try to introduce some mystery, some misunderstanding, or some desire on the part of one of the participants. Frustrate us, tease us, keep us guessing about how it’s going to turn out.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Stolen Secrets

Thanks to StoryADay-er Jeffrey T for recommending this resource!

Postsecret.comPostSecret is a site where people confess their secrets online, via postcard. Some are sweet, some are sad and some are downright disturbing. They are all fantastic moments that suggest short stories.

The Prompt

Write a story based on a secret shared at PostSecret.com

Tips

  • If you’re worried about ‘stealing’ someone’s story, don’t be. You’re inspired by the emotion behind their postcard, or the moment that it evokes. What you write won’t be their story. It’ll be yours.
  • Don’t quote the actual words on the postcard (that’s plagiarism). Just think about what inspired the person to confess this secret and go from there.
  • Don’t choose one of the tragic ones unless you like writing tragic stories. I liked this one, this one, and this one.
  • Don’t be surprised if your story veers away from your first assumptions.
  • Focus on the moment suggested by the secret. Write only about that. Use as little backstory as possible, for a taut, emotional story.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] The Big Day

Solid shadow
Today’s prompt was inspired by my recent strong reaction against the short story Heat by Joyce Carol Oates.( I hated it.)

The story is set in a past that I presume is similar to the author’s own: a world where ice deliveries still happened and kids spent long summer days largely unsupervised in their dusty country town. Then one day, something happened that no-one in the town will ever forget.

The Prompt

Mine your childhood for an event that you’ll never forget. Create a story based around it.

Tips

Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] The Big Day”

[Write On Wednesday] Examine An Object

Today’s prompt is inspired by three things. The first was the release this week of a US prisoner of war. It made me think of the many hostage and prison stories I’ve read, where people have lived in tiny cells for years on end and how it changes them. The second is the story “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, in which a woman, trapped in her domestic life, fixates on the wallpaper of her room and always finds something new to see. The third is the essay “Fish” by Robin Sloan, which shares an observation exercise, in which students are asked to observe a dead fish long past the point when it would seem to be interesting.

If you can, read both those stories and then try this prompt.

Seeing My World Through A Keyholeby Kate Ter Haar
Seeing My World Through A Keyholeby Kate Ter Haar

The Prompt

Write about a person who is forced, by circumstance or outside agency, to observe a limited view for an unlimited time.

Tips

  • Describe what they see, remembering that their use of language will reflect how they feel about the situation they find themselves in.
  • How what they see and how they feel about it change over time?
  • What do they think about when all they to do is look at the same thing over and over again?
  • How does this change over time?
  • What does this tell us about the character?
  • What universal truths might there be in what your character is thinking?
  • If you get stuck, just start a new paragraph as if some time has passed. Have your character describe the view again, and think about how they might have changed in the intervening time.
  • Don’t worry if you don’t think this is making a great story. Keep going. You’ll find a way to end it if you let the character speak.

Go!

 

[Write On Wednesday] Third Grade Word List

This week’s prompt: write a story based on a (surprisingly menacing) list of words from a Third Grade reader…

spooky shed image
“Waiting” by José María Pérez Nuñez

My third grader doesn’t bring home his reading book very often, so I don’t get to see the stories he’s working on. Each story, however, comes with a spelling list. That I DO see.

While going through the list of words with him, I got a bit bored while waiting for him to laboriously scribble them out three times each. I started doodling. And made up my own story based on the words he was learning to spell.

And now it’s your turn.

The Prompt

Write a story using the following words:

[Write On Wednesday] The Catalogue Of Disasters

Write A Story Featuring An Escalating Catalogue Of Disasters

As I woke up, I reached for my alarm clock and heard rather than felt my hand knock the full glass of water all over my bedside table – home to my iPhone, table and priceless childhood copy of A. A. Milne’s Now We Are Six. So it’s fair to say that I wasn’t in the best mood when my 8 year old declared that no, he simply wasn’t getting up or getting dressed or going to school. After that screaming match my head was pounding so I reached for some ibuprofen, only to scoop down my husband’s blood pressure medicine instead – damned blue-topped bottles! I figured I had time to drop the kids off at school before rushing myself to the ER, but of course, I had forgotten about the half inch of ice on my windscreen….

Ever had one of those days? How about your character?

The essence of story is conflict. Conflict doesn’t have to involve a bad guy. Sometimes the antagonist is simply your character’s bad mood, or the universe, or her lack of preparation.
domino

The Prompt

Write a story that features a character going through a catalogue of disasters

Tips

  • You can start this story at the beginning or the end. They can wake up and start the day off badly, ending up at the wrong end of a loaded gun; or you can start with them strapped into the electric chair, thinking ‘now, how did I get here?’
  • Likewise, the action can all by mental: you start by offending your cat and end by quitting your job in a blaze of glory, burning bridges as you go.
  • This story can be humorous or tragic, but make sure your readers are feeling what your character is feeling.
  • Keep piling on the disasters. Leave us breathless.
  • Give the reader occasional breaks by pausing for moments of backstory, if you like. See how that feels to you, as a writer. Does it cause the story to slow? Could you, instead, include backstory in conversations or pithy one-line asides.
  • Make this more immediate by writing in first person.
  • Or write this in close-third person (no-one else’s thoughts get used, but you’re still writing about your main character as ‘he’ or ‘she’). Remember not to use phrases like “she thought”, “she wondered”, “he looked”. Just tell us a thought. We’re smart enough to figure out that it’s your main character’s thoughts we’re hearing. (e.g. “Well, that wasn’t right” instead of “well, that wasn’t right, she thought”. Much more punch!)
  • Use this exercise to practice putting action into your stories. It doesn’t have to be ‘running from the law’ action. It can be all psychological (think: Jane Austen), but make sure you can have things happening in your writing at any time.

Go!

Photo: Barry Skeates

[Write on Wednesday] Eons

Write a story that takes place over eons

Merging Galaxy Cluster Abell 520
Source: Hubblesite.org

Last week we talked about writing a story in the moment before a car crash: everything in the story took place during a few seconds in the brain of your main character. This week we’re going to the opposite extreme

The Prompt

Write A Story That Takes Place Over Eons

(or just a really long time)

Tips

  • Obviously, since humans don’t live for eons, you’re going to have to choose something else as the thing that provides continuity in this story: it might be a location on the earth; a multi-generational spaceship crew traveling through unimaginable reaches of space; an alien; a centuries-old mollusk; a tree.
  • You can write a narrative story if you like, but this might lend itself to some different forms: letters, tweets, journal entries, a string of news articles; a faux-holy book written in different styles in different eras. Have fun with this.
  • Thing big thoughts. Eons give you a lot of scope to investigate big ideas.
  • Don’t make the story too long. Big ideas don’t necessarily mean high word count.
  • Don’t forget to include small details, mundane moments, things your readers can hang their emotions on.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Time Slowed Down

Write A Prompt In The Moment Before An Accident

car crash 1

You know that old cliché: time slowed?

Well, if you’ve ever been in a car crash or any kind of accident, you’ll know exactly what that means: the amygdala (the seat of emotion in your brain) kicks in and calmly starts recording every detail. When you go back over your memories, the moment will seem to have lasted at least 30% longer than it actually could have.

The way to recreate this in fiction Continue reading “[Write On Wednesday] Time Slowed Down”

[Write On Wednesday] Give Us A Hint


Yesterday I wrote about “Hint Fiction”, a book of stories told in fewer than 25 words.

The Prompt

Write A Story In No More Than 25 Words

Tips

    • Remember that, in short fiction, you are collaborating with the reader. Make them supply a lot of the detail by leaving spaces for their imaginations to fill.
    • Feel free to write a longer story first and cut it down
    • Don’t expect this to be easy or quick: 25 words is almost nothing!
    • Read this review of the book Hint Fiction to see some examples of how this can be done well.
    • Choose a moment that has some ambiguity in it.
    • Make the title count.

Here’s mine:
The Moment That Altered The Course Of Her Life

Her arm, casually draped across his chest, felt a sudden, pounding footrace: his brain vainly chasing the escaping heart-words. Her pause, a lifetime. Then: yes.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] The Glitterati

Writing prompt: what if a bunch of glamorous and exciting people came to your podunk hometown?

Paparazzi

Does your everyday life seem pretty unglamorous? What about your town?

What if you walked down the street one morning and discovered that a whole bunch of glamorous, exciting people had come to town for a spell?

The Prompt

Write a story about a small town invaded by glamorous/exciting people

Tips

The exciting people could be movie or pop stars on a location shoot, or high-profile politicians in town for a rally, or scientists flocking to study an unnatural phenomenon (think: Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver), just as long as it upsets the status quo.

Who are they? Why are they there? Who do they meet?

What do the local people think about all this?

What does your main character feel about them at the start of the story? At the end?

Who learns something from this visit? What?

Also, if you have only ever lived somewhere exciting, seeing celebrities at every coffee counter, write instead about someone really ordinary coming into a situation filled with glamour. Ask the same questions as above?

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Misunderstood

Write a open letter from a misunderstood character

Paris Traffic Wardens

Nobody loves the traffic warden. Or the referee. Or the person who tells you that yes, it’s going to be a root canal. But these people are, well, people, aren’t they?

The Prompt

Write an open letter to the world from an unloved character

Tips

  • You can use one of society’s whipping boys, such as the traffic warden, or you can use a fictional character (such as the witch from Hansel and Gretel — try to stick to characters that are in the public domain if you’re going to publish/post this anywhere)
  • The story can be a ‘day in the life’ story, where we *see* the character in a more sympathetic way, if you don’t fancy the idea of the open letter format.
  • The open letter could be in the form of a list of things we didn’t know about the maligned character or it could be an impassioned defense of their kind.
  • The character can be sad, angry, arrogant, pleading…whatever seems right.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] The Irritable Author

Write a story in which the main character acts on something that really irritates YOU

“Don’t you just wish…”

Have you ever said those words when something has really, REALLY irritated you?

Imagine what would happen if you followed through on all those little revenge-daydreams you have after someone scratches your car/talks incessantly on their phone in the library/dogears the corners of Volume 4 of your collectable edition of The Sandman 10 Volume Slipcase Set…

The Prompt

Write A Revenge-Fantasy Story

Pick something that really irritates you and write about a character who actually DOES the things you can only dream of doing (as a respectable member of a mostly-functional society).

Tips

  • Read the opening chapters of Rest You Merry by Charlotte McLeod. It starts when mild-mannered professor Peter Shandy finally snaps after being pressured to decorate his home for the annual college Christmas ‘Illuminations’. It’s deliciously hilarious.
  • Pick something that really gets under your own skin, the more mundane the better. (It will allow you to be more creative in your revenge!)
  • Show us the moment when your character snaps. Give us the physical and mental fugue-state breaking point. Remember not to tell us “he was so angry he couldn’t speak”, but to instead describe the pounding in his veins, the way his tongue cleaves to the roof of his mouth. Slow down time with the details, then let ’er rip!

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Sidelong Glances

Having trouble finishing your stories? Try this technique…

I once read an article that suggested it’s easier to talk to men/boys when you’re doing something else at the same time than by trying to sit down and have a deep and meaningful conversation with them.

[Update from 10 years after I wrote this post: Gender politics aside, this observation turned out to be super-valuable as I negotiated the tightrope walk of ‘raising’ teenagers. The conversations we had in the car, while not-looking-at-each-other have been some of the most, ah, enlightening!]

Some serious research hours went into this study that showed men (and I assume some women) find it easier to have more meaningful conversations when engaged in an activity together, than if encouraged to sit and talk things out.

Maybe they’re hiding something, or maybe they’ve just been socialized to believe feelings are icky.

Either way, it struck me that this is perfect guidance for writers: assume your characters are always hiding something (from themselves or others). Write your scenes with them as if you were a parent trying to have a heart-to-heart with a seventeen year old!

  • If you want to ratchet up the conflict, sit them down for an earnest conversation
  • If you want to have a breakthrough, give your characters a physical problem to solve together and let the conversation flow while they do it.

In this week’s prompt, I’m building in the activity. You get to pick the characters, the conflict, and how deep you go.

The Prompt

Write A Story Where the Characters are Engaged In A Hobby/Group

Tips

  • Don’t pick a hobby you’ll need to research. Pick something you like to do, so you can easily include all kinds of realistic details.
  • For example, I might pick knitting or gardening or singing in a choir. Having done all these things, I can easily conjure the personality clashes in a group of enthusiasts
    I could also talk about the tiny details that will make it more realistic: like the adrenaline rush when you think you’ve dropped a stitch, or the physical power it takes to belt out the chorus from “O Fortuna”, along with all the bizarre warm-up tricks choral directors have subjected me to over the years, from ‘ma-meh-me-mo-moo” to group shoulder massages!)
  • This is a great opportunity to work on character-building. Have your main character interact with all kinds of different characters in the group. See what shorthand you can use for each secondary character in the story, without descending into cliché.
  • Try including some tiny, here-and-now moments in the group that echo a larger issue for your main character. This strengthens the theme of the story. (e.g. if you discover that your main character’s issue is that she can’t seem to keep relationships together, allow one of the group’s participants to have issues with commitment to something in the hobby: one month he’s all about cacti, the next month he’s revamping his greenhouse to hold nothing but palms; maybe someone can’t ever seem to knit more than one sock in a pair before moving on to another project; perhaps the newbie on the sports team has been through 14 different sports before this one and can’t settle on one…).
    Mine other people’s reactions to this micro-problem to illuminate the answer to your main character’s macro-problem.
  • Linking your theme to an in-story event, transforms a character sketch or vignette into an actual story that goes somewhere.
  • If you feel you’re missing the mark on this as you write your first draft, don’t worry. Make notes as you go to help you flag this stuff on a future rewrite. (e.g. [“link this to her issue with Dave?’].
    The most important thing today, is to get a first draft finished. Get to the end of your main character’s story and set a date to come back and beef up all the theme/image/foreshadowing stuff later. (Pro tip: Put it on your calendar!)

Come back and leave a comment to let us know how you got on, this week!

[updated: 11 March 2024]

[Write On Wednesday] Things You Should Know About Me

Cammel Laird Social Club art by Half Man Half Biscuit.

This idea for a story is ripped from the song “Them’s The Vagaries” by Half Man Half Biscuit (thanks, guys!). The narrator says, near the start of the song, “Now we’ve kissed I’ve prepared this list, I thought you ought to know…” and goes on to tell his new love about all his quirks starting with “I’ll not sit backwards on the train” and proceeding down to the most bizarre of pet peeves.

The Prompt

Write a story that begins “Now that we’ve kissed, here are some things you ought to know”

Tips

  • Write this as a monologue or a dialogue, whichever works for you.
  • This has the potential to be funny or tragic.
  • Feel free to write this as a list (like the McSweeney’s lists) or as a series of tweets, or as an oral history (which will make it more like a traditional short story in form).
  • Even if you go with the non-traditional forms (lists etc) there is still a lot of scope for the beginning, middle, end structure.
  • Only the journey you take your readers on will be emotional, rather than literal (from flippant to poignant; from innocent to creepy…).
  • Think of the most colorful people you have ever met or the worst date you were ever on. Imagine one of those people writing this.

[Write on Wednesday] That Wasn’t There A Minute Ago

Your character is at work, in a place they know well. Suddenly they notice something that wasn’t there last time they looked…

This week I’m giving you a fairly specific prompt, and guiding you through the story opening with a series of questions. Use this prompt in any setting, any genre, any time period. Use it again, in a completely different setting. In fact, why not bookmark it now (do people still bookmark things?) and come back to it whenever you’re stuck.
The Stare (243/365)

The Prompt

Your character is at work, in a place they know well. Suddenly they notice something that wasn’t there last time they looked.

Tips

Don’t try to answer all these questions at once. Write a sentence or two before you look at the next question:

  • What is your character seeing/experiencing/smelling/touching/thinking about as part of their daily grind?
  • What do they notice, that is out of place?
  • Why does it suddenly stand out?
  • How does it relate to the character? (Pause here to think about your character’s backstory. Don’t put this in the story yet, but in your own head give your character a reason to connect/recoil from this new thing.)
  • Describe the object, bearing in mind how your character feels about it (but don’t tell us how your character feels about it or why)
  • What does your character want to do? What will you let them do?
  • What happens next?
  • How does it end?

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Family Drama

Oh families. The source of so many off the stories we whisper to friends, but are afraid to commit to paper for fear of offending anyone. Today’s prompt encourages you to dig into that vast repository of family stories for a ‘cheap’ way to find a plot.

The Prompt
Write a story about a stranger at a family gathering.

Tips
Think about a family gathering you’ve been to (yours or someone else’s) – preferably one where one of your most colorful relatives was on great form.
What would that look like to a stranger? (Uncle Bob’s new girlfriend or the lonely new neighbor someone invited as a nice gesture)
Take that real-life story as a jumping-off point.
Decide on a protagonist: is it your stranger or the person who invited them? Think about the protagonist’s history. What’s in their past that’s going to make this situation especially hilarious or poignant or tragic? (You don’t have to explain this in the story, but if you know about it, you’ll be able to make this character richer as you write.)
Pick one tiny incident — someone storms out, someone smashes a plate in frustration, someone swears inappropriately. Illustrate the moment and/or the ripples around the room after it happens. (Remember, this is a short story. You can’t tell too much.)
Concentrate on making the reader feel something: make me cringe with embarrassment, make me love the old grandpa, make me feel your protagonist’s regret when he misses a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to say what he really feels…

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Word List Stories

It’s back: the ever-popular (no really, it is!) exercise where we all write stories using the same list of words.
It’s silly, it’s low-stress, it is, frankly, ridiculous and it makes for a great way to break blocks or take a break after a longer or more serious project.

So here goes:

The Prompt

Write a story containing the following words
Monthly
Cute
Shortest
Wolfish
Plot
Master
World
Valuable
December

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] 100 Words For Thanksgiving

It’s almost Thanksgiving here in the US (for those non-US people: it’s a Big Deal with lots of travel and turkey and non-productivity).

So, in an effort to keep you writing but not overwhelm you, this week I’m assigning a Drabble, a 100 word story.

The Prompt

Write A 100 Word Story
100/365

Tips

  • 100 word stories sound like they won’t take up much time but they will take more than you think.
  • Remember that you don’t have much time/space to create your story. This stops you from including too much backstory, any rambling, or losing your way in the middle. Keep your mind firmly on the end.
  • Do write more than 100 words if you need to, then trim.
  • If you find yourself writing fewer than 100 words, look back and see if you can beef it up with pointed dialogue, expressive description or more of your main character’s emotions.
  • You can make the theme of the story ‘Thanksgiving’, ‘gratitude’ (or lack thereof), or something completely different if inspiration strikes.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Unseasonal Valentine

Big Heart of Art - 1000 Visual Mashups

The Prompt

Write A Valentine’s Story

I know, you think I’m crazy, right? But if you’re a sick as I am (already) of the Christmas music in the mall (it’s early NOVEMBER!) and the magazine articles about ‘holiday entertaining’, then why not strike back, by skipping the festive season altogether and writing a Valentine’s story?

The bonus here is that, should you happen to write a story draft that has promise, you’ll have plenty of time to polish it and submit it well before the Valentine’s magazine deadlines roll around (end of Nov/early Dec). If you’re more of the Do-It-Yourself-er, then you’ll still need time to polish, format and market your story before February strikes.

And if you’re just writing for fun, what could be better than letting your story take you away from the present day?

Tips

  • Put on some love songs and “think romantical thoughts”.
  • Try writing a love story with a twist. Everything gets kind of sickly sweet around Valentine’s Day. Write a story for the people who really NEED a love story that day! This might include revenge, someone asserting their independence, someone walking away from a relationship, or a good old-fashioned farce.
  • Ever watched a soppy movie or read a romance and hated the way it ended? Create some similar characters and give the story a better ending.
  • Remember that story comes from character. Know your character before you start writing — what does she want? What does she need? How are these different? That’s where your story happens.

Go!

[Write On Wednesday] Fool’s Errand

This week a major art discovery was made in Bavaria: a hoard of 1000+ art works (many by masters like Chagall and Renoir) was found in the apartment of the son of an art dealer.

These art works, it is thought, were ‘lost’ during WWII (i.e. looted, forced sales, etc.). 70 years on, many of these works must surely have been forgotten about entirely. For certain, many have never been seen by art historians. But there have been people who have pursued this type of art down through the decades since the war ended.

Which got me thinking. There have been many people who mourned, pursued and talked about this art down through the decades since the war ended. As time passed, they may have gone from sounding like crusaders to sounding like cranks. How must they have felt yesterday, when this hoard was revealed?

The Prompt

Write a story that features an obsessed character who is suddenly, unexpectedly vindicated.

Tips

  • The story can share the moment at which the vindication happens or it can happen afterwards (or perhaps even slightly before. Wouldn’t it be fun to let the reader see the vindication coming, but leave the story just before it does?)
  • Character is all in this story. It doesn’t really matter WHAT your character is obsessed with/paranoid about. The interesting parts happen in their interactions with the doubters and believers around them.
  • What would it do to a family, or a relationship, to have one member who was obsessed with an increasingly-outlandish idea through the years?
  • If you’re struggling for a topic, don’t forget the 50th anniversary of JFK’s assassination is coming up on Nov 23…

Go!